For Christians, this is a season of spiritual self-examination as we move toward the festival of our faith: Easter. Self-examination is a powerful practice as one chooses, like a recovering addict, to ruthlessly and rigorously perform a moral inventory of one’s actions and attitudes. Sometimes the result isn’t pretty. One realizes how easily most of us live out of a relentless need to justify ourselves, to make excuses and to blame others all in an effort to escape responsibility. It’s hard enough to be honest with another and harder still with one’s self. But the goal of self-examination is not despair. Rather, the goal is to get underneath the negative to experience the far greater complexity of the positive. It is to accept that this is the one, real, wild and wonderful life we have been given. This is our moment, and this is our great adventure.
As a clergy person, I live from within an institution that practices self-examination as a way of life. As with all religion one can easily see the hypocrisy. There are joyless churches full of mean and miserable souls who use religion as a weapon to abuse others and to build their own little kingdoms of power. There are churches that foster self-centeredness, self-justification and an us-versus-them mentality. And there are churches that are just plain mediocre and boring. But such analysis is really just picking at the low-hanging fruit. The reality is more complicated and more enriching than just seeing the failures of religion.
There is also goodness and success. Religious institutions organize people and money to create soup kitchens, homeless shelters, emergency care and backpacks full of school supplies for kids. It is the place of last resort when you can’t pay your utility bill or need $15 of gas to get out of Dodge. It is the free therapy center one can go in a time of personal crisis. It is the place one talks about the meaning and purpose of one’s life. It is the place where one goes after learning that their cancer is terminal. It is the place where one who doesn’t fit in anywhere else can find kindly souls who will walk with you if you let them. And, in times of cultural crisis, whether an earthquake or another social service budget cut, it is the place that organizes resistance even as it gives just enough hope that strengthens us to begin again.
We need more than just our own self to thrive in this world. Whether it is church, mosque or synagogue, whether temple, yoga center or a regular meeting of friends, it is a good thing to take time to do self-examination. You will discover the flaws, but as you look deeper you also discover the beauty. It is the beauty we seek.